


June 26

by obsidiangrey



Series: States 'Verse [10]
Category: Hetalia: Axis Powers
Genre: M/M, Marriage, Marriage Proposal, my boys are good and happy and gay
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-21
Updated: 2017-11-21
Packaged: 2019-02-05 00:26:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,711
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12782913
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/obsidiangrey/pseuds/obsidiangrey
Summary: it has been zero days since our last nonsensebig applehas changed their name tonewlywedboston stronghas changed their name tonewlywedrogue's island--yOU--YOU TOLD ME I COULD OFFICIATEnewlywed--my question is, why are you even ordainednewlywed--yeah i've never gotten an explanation for thatrogue's island--dear god i'm seeing double





	June 26

**Author's Note:**

> Here's some NewMass fluff while I'm writing the pain that is the upcoming novel for this 'verse.
> 
>  **Update 4/29/18** : for some reason, there was an Underage warning on this fic, which I must have clicked by mistake. New York and Massachusetts are both physically eighteen, and in terms of how long they've lived, more than three centuries old. Definitely no need for that warning to have been there.

It was a hot summer's day in New York City; the sun beat down on the skyscraper skyline, and though it wasn't _unusually_ hot, it was humid enough that the weather bordered on uncomfortable if one neglected to wear, at the least, shorts and a t-shirt. The streets were packed with cars and pedestrians, as they ever were, and the trains and subways powered along from place to place like blood through the veins of some great being whose heart was the metropolis itself.

Meanwhile, in the lobby at the base of a needle-like apartment building, their arms full of groceries in preparation for a celebratory lunch – it was the twenty-sixth of June, and the NYC Pride Rally was taking place in the evening, an event which held a lot of meaning for the pair in question – two young men attempted to make their way through the doors and to the elevator without dropping anything.

“Steven. Steven, if you have a hand free to look at your phone, _you have a hand free to open the doors_.”

The State of Massachusetts, generally known as Patrick, and as Pat to a select few, looked with a fond kind of exasperation towards his boyfriend, the State of New York – Steven. New York just stuck his tongue out in concentration, swiping across the screen with his thumb and tapping in a passcode:

“No, something's up, everyone's freaking out in the family chat and it's all going too quick for me to figure out what it is.”

“Everyone's always freaking out in the family group chat.”

“...Fair enough.” He put his phone between his teeth to hold it and pushed the doors open, using is foot to keep one of them there for Massachusetts to follow him through and going back to his phone for a moment. He only meant to scroll through just a little more, not seeing anything and nearly putting his phone back into his pocket-- and then he got to the news notifications which had come first, sparking the chaos in question, and froze in his tracks. “Wait-- wait. Oh, my God. Pat.”

Massachusetts hurried over, seeing the dazed expression and knowing that whatever _had_ happened either needed to be something very very good or very very _bad_ \-- he squinted down at the phone New York held out, trying to read it. New York's hand was shaking, so the fine print of the news article wasn't legible, but neither of them cared about anything but the headline. Massachusetts ignored his fingers steadily going numb from the weight of the bags he was carrying.

_**SCOTUS rules 5-4 in favor of same-sex marriage** _

“Holy shit, they actually did it.” New York laughed, a bit shaky, a bit overwhelmed. “Oh my God. Pat. _Pat._ ”

“I see it,” he replied. His own voice sounded distant. “Remember when sodomy was a crime?”

“We talking two hundred years ago or fifty?”

“Both. Either.”

“Oh my God.”

“I _know_.”

“H-- Hey. Hey, Pat.”

“Steven _Kirkland_ Jones, if you propose to me in the middle of the lobby of our apartment building while we've got our hands full of groceries, _I will fight you_.”

At the front desk, the doorman (Clark, worked there for fifteen years and never once said a word about how the two young men who rented the penthouse suite never aged a day) coughed to hide a laugh. Neither State paid him any mind; New York just grinned a wide, shaky grin and gestured as best he could with phone and groceries in hand to the elevator. “Well, then, lead the way.”

* * *

Even as the pair made their way giddily to the apartment, their phones continued to buzz incessantly with notifications from news sites as the media picked up the story and messages from their family as said articles began to reach them. New York had hardly put the grocery bags in his hands aside to get to his keys when his boyfriend had pushed him back against the wall, fingers threaded through his hair, mouth almost desperately pressed against his-- and he pressed back, because he understood.

Half the reason it had taken them so long to get together in the first place was because of how damn _difficult_ it was to be queer in the country they lived in. Of course, it was easy compared to other places, they weren't denying that. But Massachusetts had been raised in Puritan households by Puritan colonies, for all the times he had run away, and New York had never drifted too far out of so-called “polite society” growing up; being anything other than straight had been dangerous through much of their history, and still was to an extent, and it had taken both of them a long, long time to come to terms with the feelings they were experiencing, much less that they were experiencing those things for one another and that those things were _reciprocated_.

And now the highest law in the land decreed it was legal and right for them to marry just the same as any other.

...And, unfortunately, they had ice cream in with the rest of the groceries.

“Hey,” he mumbled when they pulled apart for air, “hey, hey-- first, don't wanna get kicked out by the landlord for indecent activities in the hallway--”

“You've paid rent for the _penthouse suite_ , without every missing a bill, for literal _years_. This is fine.”

“--and the faster we put everything away, the faster I can finally fucking propose.”

Massachusetts grinned up at him, a flash of white out of skin coarse and tanned and freckled from years spent by the sea. “Always knew that you New Yorkers were known for being romantics at heart.”

New York just rolled his eyes and pulled his boyfriend's hands down to hold them against his chest, kissing his lips, the tip of his nose, his forehead. Smiled in a way that he could tell was more than just a little bit lovestruck, the expression mirrored by the man in front of him, and they stared at one another for a few long moments.

“We have ice cream.”

“We _do_ have ice cream, love.”

(It took them a while to get the ice cream put away; longer to get to the office of the city clerk.)

* * *

For all that they had been raised as a family, it was just that: _family_. Nations, and therefore States, had no blood relation to one another; even those who considered one another siblings weren't _actually_ siblings in any biological sense, not even the Dakota or Carolina twins, or Virginia and West Virginia. It was a family that didn't have any kind of definition, bonds that had stood through wars and bloodshed and come through the other side, bonds that sometimes manifested as one State being _brother_ or _sister_ to another, or a friend so close a more accurate term may have been _soulmate_ , or _boyfriend_ or _girlfriend_ or--

\--husband, now.

New York watched Massachusetts shove the last of the groceries haphazardly into the fridge, not really paying any attention to where they went or in what order. They could deal with it later. There were more important things to be done.

While States, constitutionally, could not ally themselves with one another or with any foreign power, the personifications weren't quite bound by such. Some of the older Nations in Europe would argue against it, but neither had much regard for any of them, in truth. _Steven_ and _Patrick_ had announced at the annual Christmas celebration back in 1999 that when all state governments had passed laws saying people of the same gender could marry (it wasn't _fair_ that they could have a civil union in the state of Massachusetts but not anywhere else), then they would marry.

It had caused a repeat of the Christmas of '79, though the chandelier had mercifully remained intact this time around.

The two had worn wedding bands on necklaces since then, one ring purchased in Albany, the other in Boston, and New York had slipped his necklace off, sliding the simple golden band out from around his dog tags. Massachusetts wobbled a little when he turned around and saw it, hand going to his chest, where his own ring and tags rested, hidden underneath his t-shirt; New York tried for one of his sunny smiles, yet found himself near tears-- happy tears, to be sure, but tears all the same.

“Hey, Pat,” he said in little more than a whisper, the June summer sun streaming in through the penthouse windows, all his city spread out underneath him. “Patrick Jones. Would you do me the honor of becoming my husband?”

“Nothing would make me happier, Steven.”

* * *

“Pretty sure we need a witness for this.”

“That's for after we pay for the marriage license.”

“We have a marriage license.”

“We have a marriage license?”

“You insisted we fill it out online at some ungodly hour of the night when Abby sent word SCOTUS was likely to make the decision within the week-- oh. Holy _shit_ , you don't even _remember_ \--”

“Why are you laughing--”

“ _You forgot we have a marriage license_ , Steven, that's fucking _hilarious_!”

“Fuck you, Pat.”

“That can wait until the honeymoon.”

“Oh, my _God_ \--”

* * *

“Hey! Hey, sorry, d'you think you could do us a favor?”

* * *

“...I can't believe that you just roped one of your citizens into witnessing for us.”

“She was one of _my_ people, that's good enough for me.”

“Yeah, but between this and the fact that you forgot we got a marriage license--”

“Pat, please.”

“--the rest of the family is never going to let us live this down. And Robert wanted to officiate.”

“We'll have a party later, do an unofficial ceremony.”

“Fair enough.”

* * *

_it has been zero days since our last nonsense_

_big apple has changed their name to  newlywed  
_ _boston strong has changed their name to  newlywed_

 _rogue's island_  
_\--yOU LITTLE_  
_\--F UC KERS  
_ _\--YOU TOLD ME I COULD OFFICIATE_

 _ newlywed  
_ _\--my question is, why are you even ordained_

 _ newlywed  
_ _\--yeah i've never gotten an explanation for that_

 _ rogue's island  
_ _\--dear god i'm seeing double_

_ the motherland _  
_\--this is not the way a father should find out the children he raised have gotten married_  
_\--but in all seriousness  
\--congratulations  <3_


End file.
